Hillary Clinton: “We have to get back to regular order.”

In one of his final appearances on the Senate floor, Senator John McCain urged his colleagues on both sides of the aisle to get back to regular order. Hillary Clinton echoed that imperative on The Rachel Maddow Show last night. Appearing on the anniversary of the release of her book, What Happened, and upon the release of the paperback edition with a new afterword (also published in The Atlantic), Hillary addressed, among other topics, the Kavanaugh confirmation logjam, the Special Counsel probe, the Manafort deal, and the ongoing Russian influence not only in our elections but in our very interactions.

Rachel began the interview quoting from the piece that ran in The Atlantic, and asked Hillary why she is afraid of losing our country. Hillary responded saying that putting aside ideological concerns we have to defend our democracy. Degrading the rule of law, de-legitimizing elections, attacking truth and reason, undermining our unity … is a crisis. She said the authoritarian tendencies, left unchecked could result in the erosion of our institutions to an extent that we have never imagined here. We are not there yet, she contends, but that is because there is an election. “We need a new Congress, and we need a new Republican party.”

With a new Congress, Hillary thinks we need an agenda broader than one of impeachment. She listed policy changes already made, and said those need to be addressed. If people do not go out and vote, she thinks we will see more dismantling of institutions.

She believes that she was clearly a part of the puzzle where Russian interference was concerned in 2016, but she thinks they are playing a longer game of undermining democracy here and globally. She said, “Foreign money, foreign interference in our elections, I don’t care if it’s from the right, the left, the center, up, down; I don’t care where it’s from. It’s wrong. It’s illegal,and the American people deserve to know if it happened so we can try to prevent it.”¹

Rachel replayed a clip from a year ago where Hillary said we have to depend on those around Trump to be our first line of defense against him doing something that might have serious repercussions. The Times op-ed of September 5 and Bob Woodward’s Fear appear to show that remark to have been predictive.

Her prediction now is that after the election Trump will wholesale fire people. She said he is close to being uncontrollable. She is hoping people will see that we need checks and balances and will vote accordingly. While she has not heard any specifics of invocation of the 25th Amendment, she thinks there are private discussions in the White House, and that people are worried.

It was a broad, extensive interview and thought-provoking. Hillary has warned us in the past. Once again she is sounding the alarms. Yes, we must get out the vote. But we must do more. We need to hold the government accountable. First, we must hold the line. Then, we must repair the damage. That demands advocacy. It is going to take more than a village. It is going to take the whole country.

¹Please bear this comment in mind and take it very seriously to heart if you are one of those who defends a “Hillary supporter” whom you suspect or know not to be American but who insists upon not only impersonating an American but also insists upon telling Americans how to think and how to vote. Proxies, trolls, sock puppets, and bots take every side. There is a purpose to this alleged support. Do not be duped.

8 Responses

I thought her analysis of what the Republicans are trying to do with the Kavanaugh confirmation now was very interesting and spot on. She said they are trying to put Dr. Ford “in the dock”. And she also said that the entire process has been “rushed and opaque”. It’s pretty clear that they don’t want a fact finding process to precede a hearing in which Kavanaugh and Dr. Ford are the only witnesses even though Dr. Ford placed another individual right in the room during the attack. That is why there must be an FBI investigation first. Then there will be a set of facts that everyone can stipulate to, and ALL relevant witnesses can be interviewed.

If the Republicans allow any other witnesses, it will be the meaningless “character witnesses” they have placed such emphasis on during the hearings. And anyone who thinks such vouching is not meaningless, should read Ann Rule’s true crime classic, The Stranger Beside Me. Rapists and, even serial killers, are not visible to the naked eye.

Just on a technical note, the footnote was mystifying because I did not realize it was a footnote. Instead, it looked like an odd comment. Once, I connected it to text, then everything fell into place.

Please forgive me if I am being too overbearing but perhaps you could insert it as an Editor’s Note in brackets directly underneath her quote. It’s an important point but gets lost as a footnote following all the photos.

Otherwise, thanks much for the excellent paraphrase of the interview and the link to the full interview.

So weird many of them are 15! All of the pr about what a great guy he is seems like a calculated pre-emptive strike in hindsight. And Ed Whelan throwing this Garret dude under the bus is the latest sign of panic. Now Kavanaugh will have to answer ?’s about his involvement in this smear campaign. My guess is the Republicans will ram this thru no matter what, and SCOTUS will be one more American institution they have destroyed. Putin must be very pleased with himself.

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